What Donald Trump taught me about democracy

On January 6, 2021, I watched the television in horror and disbelief as a mob of Donald Trump’s supporters, hopped up on his lies about a stolen election, ransacked the Capitol, viciously attacked Capitol police, and forced members of Congress of both parties to hide in fear for their lives. Congress had gathered that day to perform its Constitutionally-mandated duty of certifying Joe Biden as the 46th President of the United States. The attack forced the postponement of the certification.

I grew up understanding that one of the things that made our democracy the envy of the world was our unbroken string of peaceful transfers of power — a string that began with George Washington ceding authority to John Adams in 1797 and going home to Mount Vernon as a private citizen.

The attack on the Capitol ended that unparalleled 224-year streak.

Like many, I wept for our country that day.

The peaceful transfer of power was not something that I or anyone I knew had previously given much thought to. It was just assumed that we would always have peaceful transfers — that’s how it worked in America. It always had happened and always would. How could it be any other way?

January 6 violently disabused me of that notion. But that awful day made me appreciate how precious, fragile, and remarkable that streak really was. It represented a centuries-old collective commitment to resolving our political differences peacefully – an essential element of a functioning democracy. So in a weird but quite direct way, I have Trump to thank for that appreciation.

Little did I know that in the following years, in the same back-handed way, Trump would be responsible for an invigorated understanding of much of what makes our country special and worth fighting for.

Take the rule of law – the principle that we are a nation of laws, not men, and no man is above the law. It is the cornerstone of our democracy, and is what separates us from dictatorship.

The rule of law is so fundamental to the American enterprise, so ingrained in our society, that most people never gave it a second thought. Thinking about it would be like wondering if the sun would come up tomorrow. It was just…there, a given, an immutable fact of living in the United States.

Until, suddenly and jarringly, it wasn’t. In Trump’s second term, the rule of law is under the gravest, most comprehensive attack in the history of our country. In countless ways, Trump has shown his contempt for the rule of law and his belief that he is not subject to it.

He has declared his right to “terminate” the Constitution and announced that “He who saves his Country does not violate any Law.” The masked thugs of ICE murder people in broad daylight with no accountability. His administration imprisons people and deports them without the due process guaranteed by the Constitution. He has sought to grab for himself powers that are vested by the Constitution exclusively in Congress, such as the power to wage war and impose tariffs. He has issued unconstitutional executive orders aimed at preventing lawyers – the traditional guardians of the rule of law – from challenging his conduct. As a federal judge recently wrote, his administration has “likely violated more court orders in January 2026 than some federal agencies have violated in their entire existence.” He had his attorney general purport to grant him and his family total immunity for all past misconduct – the very definition of being above the law.

I could go on (and on), but you get the point.

As a result, the rule of law is no longer an abstract concept that we can afford to take for granted. It is instead urgently top of mind for those who care about our democracy. As Samuel Johnson said, “when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.” We now viscerally understand the importance of the rule of law in a way we didn’t before.

Also in jeopardy is our understanding of the United States as a force for good in the world. Our country certainly wasn’t perfect before Trump, but it regularly tried to do the right thing. The assistance provided by the United States Agency for International Development saved hundreds of thousands of lives every year; the Trump administration dismantled it. The Centers for Disease Control was the international gold standard in public health; its reputation and credibility are now in tatters. Our armed forces were famously a pure meritocracy; now blacks and women are routinely passed over for promotions. Again, I could go on and on.

Most people never spent much time thinking about the benevolent and fair-minded things our government used to do. Now they mourn what we have lost.

Ironically, Trump’s depredations have given us a deeper regard for what really makes America great. In Joni Mitchell’s fitting words, “Don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you’ve got til it’s gone?”

James Speyer is a lawyer and a volunteer for Lawyers Defending American Democracy. He lives in Sharon.